Summary: Rest is necessary to run the race God has marked out for us.

Rest is vital to our well being physically, mentally, and spiritually.

God created the Sabbath to be a means of revitalization. It is a day to heed God’s invitation: “Be still and know that I am God” (Psalm 46:10). It is a day to delight in Jesus’ words “Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest” (Matthew 11:28). As Jesus says, the Sabbath was made for man (Mark 2:27).

Rest and relaxation is crucial. Take a look at what some in the medical field have to say:

Relaxation is perhaps the single most important key to health and well-being. It is the antidote to stress which is known to contribute to the development of disease. When we relax, our body has an opportunity to unwind. The benefits of relaxation have been well researched and some of these are summarized below.

God definitely has our best interest in mind by calling us to “Be still and know that I am God.” Times of rest and relaxation are not to be done just for the sake of being done and nothing else. Rest and relaxation is to be purposeful. The purpose is not to enlarge a personal comfort zone where one becomes complacent or lazy. I strongly believe we are called to Be still so that we can run!

Listen to what a couple of websites share about rest in the life of an athlete:

Most athletes know that getting enough rest after exercise is essential to high-level performance, but many still over train and feel guilty when they take a day off. The body repairs and strengthens itself in the time between workouts, and continuous training can actually weaken the strongest athletes.

Rest days are critical to sports performance for a variety of reasons. Some are physiological and some are psychological. Rest is physically necessary so that the muscles can repair, rebuild and strengthen. For recreational athletes, building in rest days can help maintain a better balance between home, work and fitness goals.

In the worst-case scenario, too few rest and recovery days can lead to overtraining syndrome - a difficult condition to recover from.

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And again:

One of the most important, yet overlooked, aspects of any exercise or training program is the recovery phase, or time spent resting. It is all too common a thought that rest time is a period of doing no work, and while you are not actually doing any physical work, physiologically your body is seizing the opportunity to repair itself to become stronger in preparation for the next exercise stress placed upon it. It is during rest that the body becomes stronger.

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Now that we have looked at the necessity and benefits of rest for the mind and body, I would like to now look at the necessity and benefits of rest spiritually.

Rest refreshes the body and mind which in turn enables one to refresh spiritually. A person who is constantly going 90 to nothing, will exhaust themselves to the point of becoming unresponsive to the things of God.